Friday, 14 August

Dear <<First Name>> , 

The unreliable nature of grid-supplied power in parts of Sub-Saharan Africa is an issue that many in the region still have to grapple with. This week, the cumulative power outages of 2020 in South Africa passed the entirety of 2019, with 661 hours of load shedding. Without considerable investment to improve the country’s power capacity and resilience, it will be impossible for the region to fully meet its electricity demand without continued, and perhaps more acute power interruptions. These failures have led the South African government to look elsewhere to overcome load shedding. This search has brought them to the DRC, where they have reaffirmed their commitment to buy power from the Grand Inga III hydroelectric dam.

Our colleagues working from home in Johannesburg have been experiencing the interruptions of load shedding first-hand. But at Camco, we have a fantastic opportunity to create positive change. Our team is passionate about making reliable, affordable energy available to all in sub-Saharan Africa. Every day, we make this vision a reality by helping independent power producers along the long and complex path to financial close.

Cheers

Geoff Sinclair

Managing Director, Camco Clean Energy

West Africa

Chad: Government considering 200MW solar-plus-storage plant (PV-Magazine)
- Argentinian-based Alcaal Group will conduct feasibility studies on the outskirts of N’djamena. 

Ghana: Government moratorium on signing new renewable energy agreements (Energy Mix Report)
- Energy minister reveals that the previous administration had signed too many unnecessary deals resulting in higher consumer prices.

Southern Africa

South Africa: Despite recent demand slump load shedding for 2020 has surpassed 2019 levels (Engineering News)
- Load shedding for 2020 stands at 1,353GWh, or 661 hours so far,  with increases likely to persist for another two years at least.

East Africa

DRC: Spanish and Chinese companies reach agreement to form consortium for Inga III hydro project (Afrik21)
- With the new agreement in place work can begin on the 11,050MW hydroelectric project.

Kenya: KenGen will start installing public EV charging stations (Clean Technica)
- Company hopes this will increase consumer demand for electricity and help boost revenues.

Kenya: Construction on Koru-Soin hydro dam set to begin in September (Energy Mix Report)
- Multipurpose dam will generate 2MW and provide additional benefits to the local populace.

Africa - general

General: AfDB further scales up climate financing (Afrik21)
- Climate finance, which includes renewable energy, increases to 35% of total annual project approvals worth US10.5 billion.

General: Minigrid use is expanding but regulations are hampering growth (Africa Business Magazine)
- Report reveals that connections and associated cost have fallen drastically but wider scale adoption is prohibited by regulation.

Rest of World

Batteries: Battery manufacturing set to increase fourfold to 1.4TWh by 2030 (PV-Magazine)
- The Asia-Pacific region in China will retain dominance but Europe's market share is set to drastically increase.

Solar: Innovative approach to community solar in the United States (PV-Magazine)
- Company will use solar credits to fund to provide benefits to  local communities.

General: Net-metering is becoming more popular throughout Middle East and Africa (ESI)
- Net-metering is being used to increase capacity and review emissions.

General: Blast at Chinese plant sees polysilicon prices soar (FT)
- Prices for the primary raw material of solar panels have increased by 56%.

General: Solar and wind double global share of power in five years (Bloomberg)
- Renewable energy sources made up nearly 10% of total production in most of the world.

Currencies